


In Time's Eye

by owl_coffee



Category: Chronicles of Narnia - All Media Types, Chronicles of Narnia - C. S. Lewis
Genre: M/M, Multi
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-12-24
Updated: 2013-12-24
Packaged: 2018-01-05 23:33:33
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death, Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,597
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1099861
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/owl_coffee/pseuds/owl_coffee
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Cities Thrones and Powers<br/>Stand in Time's Eye,<br/>Almost as long as flowers,<br/>Which daily die:<br/>But, as new buds put forth<br/>To glad new men,<br/>Out of the spent and unconsidered Earth<br/>The Cities rise again</p><p>What would it really be like to be a great King and return a thousand years later to a strange land? Edmund is about to find out.</p>
            </blockquote>





	In Time's Eye

"Shortly after the last apple had been eaten, Susan went down to the well to get another drink. When she came back she was carrying something in her hand. "Look," she said in a rather choking kind of voice. "I found it by the well." She handed it to Peter and sat down. The others thought she looked and sounded as if she might be going to cry. Edmund and Lucy eagerly bent forward to see what was in Peter's hand - a little, bright thing that gleamed in the sunlight.  
"Well, I'm - I'm jiggered," said Peter, and his voice sounded queer. Then he handed it to the others.  
All now saw what it was - a little chess-knight, ordinary in size but extraordinarily heavy because it was made of pure gold; and the eyes in the horse's head were two tiny little rubies - or rather, one was, for the other had been knocked out." - Prince Caspian

 

Edmund tried to deny the thing until the last piece of resistance had been knocked out of him. "Cair Paravel wasn't on an island."  
"Yes, I've been wondering about that. But it was a what-do-you-call-it, a peninsula." said Peter in his lecturing-to-children voice, "Jolly nearly an island. Couldn't it have been made an island since our time? Somebody has dug a channel."  
"But half a moment!" said Edmund. He had a lurching, sickening feeling in the pit of his stomach now. "You keep on saying _since our time_. But it's only a year and a half ago since we came back from Narnia. And if you want to make out that in one year castles have fallen down, and great forests have grown up, and little trees we saw planted ourselves have turned into a big old orchard, and goodness knows what else. It's all impossible."

He couldn't deny it any longer when they rediscovered the treasure chamber, though. Everything was there just as it had been, save a thick layer of dust. It was bitterly cold, and there was something leachingly sad about the place. It was as if all their youth and joy had been walled up inside a tomb for a thousand years, left to decay. The others walked round examining the things and exclaiming, "Oh look! Our coronation rings - do you remember first wearing this? - Why, this is the little brooch we all thought was lost - I say, isn't that the armour you wore in the great tournament in the Lone Islands?"  
Edmund found himself drawn to the chest that he knew was his. He didn't know what would pain him most - if there was nothing, or if Peridan had left some note, some sign. Oh, Peri. Despite himself Edmund's hands opened the chest anyway, hoping against hope, a mad hope, that it all could be explained - that it had really only been a few years, that this was some enchantment of a returned White Witch. But his trembling fingers found the envelope, and all hope was extinguished as he read the ancient, crumbling contents.

_My dearest Edmund,  
I know this note will probably never reach you. You and your sisters and brother must have returned to Spare Oom, for there has been no sign of you in Narnia. Aslan knows, I've looked hard enough these past years. At first we thought you must have been taken by Calormenes (though how they could have penetrated so far into Narnia no-one knew). But my sources in Calormene found nothing, even when I went there myself. You have vanished from the surface of the earth. If I could find Queen Susan's horn I would blow it and perhaps bring you back to me, but it vanished along with you. And Aslan, too, has left us. Gone are the days where he would walk with Narnians and give us counsel. He is away, too, and it is left to me and a few others to hold off the Calormenes and the rest. We are failing, without you. They have already conquered Archenland from the sea - Archenland, that we never thought would fall, the gateway into Narnia. I think of the future and I am afraid. That is why I decided to write this, and leave it where you might come across it, if you come back years from now and wonder what became of me. I remember you telling me that time in Spare Oom and War Drobe works differently from that in Narnia - a day might pass for you an it be a year for me. If you were held there, in your world - not able to return - it might be many years. Too many for me to greet you again with joy. I enclose the ring I was going to give you when you returned from your ride. I had it all prepared, a little speech and all. You would have laughed at me, at my unaccustomed seriousness. I hope you would perhaps have accepted._

_Wherever you are, I pray that you are safe. My love always,  
Peridan_

Edmund couldn't bear it. "Look here. We mustn't waste the battery: goodness knows how often we shall need it." His voice cracked. "Hadn't we better take what we want and get out again?"  
"We must take the gifts," said Peter, and went to gather up his sword and armour.  
Edmund put on the ring, and did not take it off.

When they at last emerged into the sunlight again, everyone was rather subdued. If anyone noticed Edmund had been crying, they didn't comment on it. As they were all settling down to sleep, Lucy talked quietly with him. "What is it? You saw something in there, didn't you?"  
"Oh, Lucy. Everyone we knew - "  
"I know." She suddenly stiffened. "Peridan! Edmund, was he - "  
"He left a note. In my chest."  
"I'm so sorry."  
"Don't worry about it, Luce. Serves me right for getting so involved, doesn't it? I should've known that we couldn't stay here forever."  
"You don't mean that."  
"I don't wish to discuss it any further. Goodnight." Edmund almost added, Queen Lucy. As if he was rebuking her after a diplomatic scandal again. Memories of Narnia kept flooding back to him here - he couldn't believe how much he had forgotten. He had tried, so hard, to remember Peri - but his memory on Earth was treacherous and couldn't seem to hold everything. Now it all came back. And he would never see Peri again. Not ever.  
"Tumnus is dead too, you know." Lucy's voice was quiet in the dark. "But I would _never_ say I was sorry for getting involved. Getting involved is all you can do, sometimes. It's what makes life."  
"I - you know, you're a good sister, Lucy."  
"Love you too. Now, sleep. Things will feel a bit better in the morning." She was so blessedly optimistic about everything. But he did sleep, in the end.

***

Edmund was afraid that Peridan's ring wouldn't travel back with him, but some special virtue in Aslan's door allowed it to. He still didn't know why they hadn't been allowed to stay in Narnia those thousands of years earlier, but accepted that it wasn't Aslan's fault. If they hadn't gone hunting the Stag this would all never have happened. He might have lived and grown old with Peridan. The ring was his small token of a fork in the path. A wrong choice.

Peter said that Aslan thought Edmund and Lucy would come back to Narnia one day. It grew almost unbearable waiting for the moment, and then he finally accepted that it would never come. Even if it did, it would be different again - another thousand years would have passed, and all their new friends dead. At least they had stayed a shorter time. Not gotten over-attached to anyone. That was what the schoolmasters said, wasn't it? Overly attached. 'Forms strange attachments' on his report card, and Mother and Father frowning at him concernedly for a while. If they knew -! But schoolboys didn't appeal to him anymore. He felt too old, hideously old, and the whole puerile atmosphere of boarding school sickened him. As if it were the act itself and nothing more that mattered. Love didn't come into the equation. Sometimes, when he felt desperate, he would give in to it, because everyone did. But afterwards, he would twist Peri's ring on his finger and think, _sorry, sorry_.

A prefect tried to take the ring off him, once. A bullying sort of person, who liked to have his little bit of power over the younger boys. "What's that on your finger, Pevensie Minor? I don't think that's allowed in the uniform code. Why don't you take it off and give it to me?" The boy wasn't used to fighting dirty. He was used to playground fights, a little rough-and-tumble in the dirt bruising your knuckles. All Edmund had ever fought for was his life. He had to remind himself not to hurt the other too much, just to teach him a lesson. Of course, word of it got to the masters, and he was reprimanded. But Mr Scroton, who was his favourite, let him keep the ring after. Just as well, he would've gotten himself expelled for it, if necessary. "A love-token from a girl at home, is it?" asked the old man sympathetically.  
"Something like that," mumbled Edmund, ashamed of himself in the half-lie.  
"Well, you keep it by all means. But don't wear it around. Keep it in your pocket, eh? Don't want to make the others jealous, or look like you're bending the dress code."  
"Thank you, sir."

**Author's Note:**

> Edmund is an interesting character. He's a negotiator, ambassador, king - subtle and intelligent. Because of his betrayal of his siblings to the White Witch, he always feels as if he can never quite trust his emotions. Must always be master of them, in control. Otherwise terrible things can happen. Your emotions can lead you astray, better to quash them for the greater good, the good of Narnia. The one time he gave in and allowed himself to be human with someone else was snatched away pretty fast. He doesn't adjust well to living on Earth. He's all about restraint and diplomacy. Until his carefully built control unravels when faced with a determined examination by Caspian...


End file.
